


Triptych of Longing

by gnostic_heretic



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Complicated Relationships, Multi, Romantic Angst, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-10
Updated: 2018-10-10
Packaged: 2019-07-29 05:42:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,080
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16257824
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gnostic_heretic/pseuds/gnostic_heretic
Summary: About love, time, and the walls people (and nations) build between each other. A three-part narration of unrequited love.





	Triptych of Longing

**i. Saints on Golden Skies**

 

As far as he can remember, Estonia has always been observing, and shaping himself to adapt.

The flow of time, incessant and unavoidable, was not something that weighed on his thoughts the way it did for many other nations he knew. The world changes, people change: why shouldn’t we change too?

How foolish is it to think that we can remain the same, when centuries pass and life evolves? Keeping up with the Modern Era, whatever those words can mean, is part of what makes a nation survive.

And yet, there are certain things that Estonia cannot change, no matter how much he tries, no matter how much he has already tried over the course of his life.

Lithuania is one of those things, or better, one of those people, one of those  _ relations _ .

It’s not like Lithuania has not changed since the first time they met: the proud hunter and ambusher who wouldn’t accept defeat, would never renounce his Gods had turned into a disillusioned man whose life was ruled by anxiety and stress.

 

After all the decades, centuries, however, Lithuania’s smile had always been the same. He has gained a few freckles, maybe.

His eyesight has become worse, but he has the same longing for sacred wilderness in his gaze. Something of their ancestors has persisted in him, but Estonia doesn’t envy him for that.

Estonia knows, because he has always been observing him, from the sidelines, from his spot in the corners of Lithuania’s life. 

Estonia is observing Lithuania as he pours himself a cup of coffee, with a satisfied smile after he has finished hanging a new painting in his own living room.

“The frame is not straight,” Estonia corrects him, promptly walking towards the wall to fix the problem. “There, it looks better now.”

“Thank you so much, Eduard. If I hadn’t forgotten my glasses at work… enough chattering, whatever. Do you want some coffee?”

“Sure thing.”

 

The coffee is black and bitter and burns Estonia’s throat as he drinks it.

He tries his best to hide his grimace, to not offend his  _ friend _ ’s coffee-brewing skills; Lithuania, however, is looking the other way. Sipping from his own mug as he contemplates the mediocre painting on the wall, as if he’s immersed in it completely.

 

The subject matter is such a typical one, a golden field and a blue line of summer sky. There is nothing special about it, except the fact that apparently,  _ Poland  _ has painted it. 

Estonia feels the bitter burn in his throat once again, but the mug he’s holding is empty.

 

In perspective, the gold surrounding Lithuania’s head reminds him of the icons Russia kept all over his house in Moscow. He remembers their fixed gazes as he walked through the corridors, and the stiff blessings, a relic of the past. Unchanged. Immutable.

 

_ He’s here, but he might as well not be.  _

Lithuania cannot see him, and he has  _ tried _ , he has  _ adapted _ , over and over! 

He had been a brother, friend, nurse, warrior, ally, partner in crime. 

(He had been a lover, if only for one night and never again. Was this what he wanted? He had tried to chase away those feelings, and failed. One of those few things that Estonia couldn’t seem to change, apparently.)

 

What more should he do? What more should he change, so that Lithuania will look at him,  _ finally  _ look at him?

 

It’s then that Lithuania turns, and looks at him and his empty cup with a smile.

“Do you want some more coffee? Before it goes too cold.”

When Lithuania touches his hand to take his cup, so he can fill it once again, his fingers are warm. A moment of closeness, a blessing, if only for a split second in time.

Perhaps, Estonia thinks, he doesn’t need to change anything, after all.

* * *

 

 

**ii. Ave Regina Caelorum**

 

The door knocked twice, each time stronger. Gilbert grunted a sloppy "come in" and rolled to the opposite side of his bed. 

It was Hungary who walked into the room, her silk kimono flowing around her legs with each sway of her hips.

(He remembered her in armour, her long hair flowing in the wind- a ghost of a time long gone, a dream dissipated. Her hair was held tight into a chignon now, and left in the whole room a faint scent of vetiver.)

She shot him a look- he did not dare look up, into her eyes. 

"Everyone is waiting for you, Gilbert." 

"Mhm. Let them wait." He knew that, and he also knew that a boring party filled with pretentious aristocratic pricks was the last thing he wanted to attend right now.

Hungary glared at the lump under his blankets. "Who's sleeping there?"

Gilbert smirked. "My woman. Shoot, you got me there! Lucille, you can come out..."

Lucille did come out, slender and gorgeous, and lovingly licked his face. Hungary wrinkled her nose. "You sleep with your... dog?"

"She keeps me company," he shrugged. "Besides, what are  _ you  _ doing away from the big party?" 

The Italian greyhound wagged her tail, jumping on Hungary's clean silks.

(But Erzsébet looked like she didn't mind at all, bless her.) 

She sat down on the bed next to him, and sighed.

"Roderich is at it again. The piano... he’s showing off like a circus clown. Like he’s the second coming of Mozart. It’s irritating."

Prussia looked at her face carefully. "I thought you found his little musical numbers charming. But there's something more, isn't there?" 

She shrugged, intent on petting Lucille's head. She didn't dare look at him. 

"There's... another young man with him. Singing Schubert's whatever... I don't care for it. I just don't care."

"Erzse." Gilbert gulped. It had been a long time since he had called her name, at least this way, with the two of them alone.

"Yes?"

“Are you jealous?”

“ _ No!” _

"Do you love him?"

Hungary tried to hide the blush creeping up her neck with her sleeve, to no avail. "I suppose."

Gilbert chuckled. "You can say yes or no, it's fine." 

Her sad smile said it all. "Can you come to the party with me? It's terribly boring. And we need some entertainment, I’ve had enough of music for the next forty years."

"Yes, I bet all of the countesses and duchesses are dying without me, aren't they? Longing for their awesome, irreplaceable Prussian prince! Roderich’s piano and his loverboy have nothing that can equal my charms."

"More like every court needs its fool, Gilbert!"

She elbowed him right in the ribs, and it hurt, but Gilbert didn't mind at all- he stood up and grabbed his jacket, neatly folded on a chair. 

"Don't worry, Erzsébet. I'll be right there." 

"Thank you so much. I’ll wait outside as you get… uh… dressed."

Her kimono flowed away with her, waves of red and green as her figure disappeared in the empty corridor. When had she learned to walk like that, anyway? One day he had to invite her on a hunting trip, or a horse ride, to get some dirt back on those legs and chase her around like they did when they were children.

Gilbert wondered why he did it, invite and party and all. Why had he spent all of his life chasing her, when she was always so far ahead. He wondered why he couldn't seem to stop, no matter how much he tried to let those unnamed, unknowable thoughts and feelings go. 

Gilbert wondered, and found that if it was all for Erzsébet, he didn't mind at all.

* * *

 

 

**iii. Memento Mori**

 

_ It’s over _ , Malcolm needs to remind himself more than once,  _ it’s over and it has been for hundred of years _ . He has barely touched his coffee, and the company of his brother Emrys– who is silently reading a book next to him, an old copy of  _ Macbeth _ , leaving his drink untouched as well– is barely helping.

The radio is playing a cheerful song, a cheesy pop piece that he has never heard before. The american accent of the singers hurts his ears and his sensibility, but he has other things to think about. More pressing matters. Like the man sitting in front of him.

 

Maybe this sense of overwhelming is because he just came back from months of isolation, and what a coincidence to find  _ him  _ back in London, and not just the asshole he calls “brother”.

He wonders what  _ he’s  _ doing there, and why he found  _ him  _ and Arthur chatting together, what relation the two of them have (an answer that always shifts dramatically depending on who you ask, and when); but then, of course, the answer this time is that it’s just for political reasons, adjustments about the European Union’s economy and whatnot.

 

As if he is technically, formally, not part of the European Union as well.

_ Couldn’t they have asked me?  _

Well, he has been absent, but have they asked Wales?

He doubts it. Wales himself doesn’t help at all, absorbed as he is into reading whatever, completely ignoring any conversation that is going on right now. A conversation that Malcolm himself has lost track of.

 

“So how about you? How are you doing? England has told me about your  _ vacation _ , and I’ve heard your cottage location has a wonderful landscape. Will you take me there, sometimes?”

Malcolm nods, wondering if the flirty tone implies anything that François doesn’t want to say out loud. Seduction, seduction, the  _ game  _ of seduction… they say in love and war all is fair, but he never got quite the hang of the “love” part.

“Only if you can survive a week without electricity.”

“Ah, but you forget, we have survived centuries without that. It will certainly bring back memories.”

“ _ That _ ...  that’s for sure.” 

His face has probably turned as red as his hair, and François must have noticed. He always notices. And he’s sure that this sentence did, indeed, mean something  _ more _ .

 

_ Of course, of course it would bring back memories. Memories of the days we shared and the nights we spent together, memories of your golden hair sprawled over my pillows, of the ways you would cling to me in winter, complaining about the cold. _

_ When we were young, and green, and I was foolish– and thought that “love” could ever be something that could happen to the likes of us.  _

 

“Then,” François interrupts his thoughts with a voice sweet as honey, “I’ll be looking forward to your invite.” 

He adjusts a lock of blond hair behind his ear, and Malcolm’s throat feels dry and itchy.

“I missed talking to you.”

“Me too,” Malcolm lies.

 

Whatever will happen in that cottage, if he were to invite him, would it be love?

What they once called that had been tainted, broken, washed away by a stream of blood.

But if Malcolm were wrong, and it could be love after all: can love undo betrayal, indifference, the death that once had been?

 

_ “Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood clean from my hand?  _

_ No, this my hand will rather the multitudinous seas incarnadine, making the green one red.” _

 

All of a sudden, Emrys shuts his book and stands from his seat.

“Well! I think it’s time for me and Malcolm to go. Isn’t it?”

“It is.”

François pouts from the other side of the table, muttering something about how they should see each other soon, and how they don’t talk enough. He tries to go for a hug, but Malcolm compromises with a handshake. 

Perfectly formal, as it suits two sovereign nations, meeting each other for a casual chat. Nothing less, but more importantly, nothing  _ more _ .

_ Even now, _ he thinks as he and Wales leave the café, _ the fortresses we build are taller and stronger than they have ever been. They’re just invisible, unassailable castles of the mind _ .

 

He will probably never invite France to his cottage, and he is sure that France knows it as well.

 

It’s probably for the best.

 

There is, however, a sharp ache in his heart, a sense of longing that he fully expected to feel the moment he had accepted to meet France at all. Melancholy, what a folly…  _ it’s over, and it has been for centuries _ . He needs to repeat that more, if needed, until his heart will catch up.

In the meanwhile, a cigarette will work to calm his frantic heartbeat.

Later tonight, he will write an epitaph for the death of his Love. 

 

**Author's Note:**

> >Me: promises something less sad  
> >Also me: hello here's this.  
> :'DD  
> Thank you to anyone who read so far! I hope you enjoyed the humble little fic I present to you.  
> There's plenty of parallels in the three situations presented, yet each is unique in its own quiet tragedy; and hopefully even something sad (can i say "angsty"? does this count as "angst"?) like this could reasonate with you, reader...  
> I thank you again, for the opportunity you all gave me to share words with everyone. And if you have anything to say, positive, or negative, feedback is always encouraged and appreciated. <3


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